Theo was that moment in The Wizard of Oz, you know, when she steps out into a new world of too-saturated pigments, the miasma of flowers and red glitter and golden bricks. When Jack had watched a wibbly copy of that film on their fuzzy television, he’d almost been sick from the transition—black-and-white was so much closer to his life, the way it had always been, and little Jack had wondered in that moment if he would ever truly see in color.

And now he had.

And it was five in the morning, and he’d only gotten four hours of sleep, and he was full of disgust at this fully realized truth, and even so he was going to get two cups of coffee and meet Theo in the silvery light of sunrise.

And it felt so good. Dangerously good.

He pulled on a pair of jeans, a fresh shirt, a hooded jacket, and stopped by the café he’d seen on his first morning here. He wandered up the hill to the University College Cork campus, smelling the river, watching blackbirds take flight.

In his whole life he had taken so few moments to notice beauty. His childhood was bereft of beauty. Everything here was still, crystallized in the hour before waking. The grass of the quad was perfectly manicured, soft and trimmed and so green. He watched the shimmer of the rising sun and the breeze caressing blossoming trees and he felt a part of it all, as if he could fragment and become an essential element of this place, removed from the rest of his world.

It felt so much like a dream—this hour, this day, this place—and he wasn’t sure if he ever wanted to wake up.

Theo, waiting for him—God, Jack could get used to that, being wanted—was washed out, almost white in the faint strains of sunlight, and yet another beautiful thing he thought he’d never get to see. Get to have.

“Gardner.” Theo held out his hand for a paper cup, eyes still clouded with sleep.

“Beau.” He imitated the regal—if exhausted—tone and passed him his coffee.

Theo rolled his eyes. “Do shut up.” He took a sip, looked away. “It was—perfectly acceptable when you used my given name.” Theo waved his hand. “Feel free to do so.”

Jack felt a smile pull at his face. He’d never realized how totally awkward Theo was. “Oh, right. Theo.”

The name tasted good as he spoke it. His voice was softer than he intended, with an undercurrent of—something. Something too nice for the guy he’d pulled off the night before. A history unspooling from his tongue of two people who’d always, it seemed, known each other in the deepest places.

Theo blushed, just a pale tint of color.